Gone to Bridge

Tributes to those faithful family friends who have gone on to the Rainbow Bridge.

If Tears Could Build A Stairway,
And Memories A Lane,
I'd Walk Right Up to Heaven
And Bring You Home Again

Maggie came to us from Bulwark Kennels in Canada when she was 12 weeks old.
Its probably a good thing we didn't know her registered name was "Bulwark's Little Brown Jug" when
we were picking a name for her, or she'd undoubtedly have been known forever more as Jughead.

Brandy, an American Pit Bull Terrier, was the first dog my husband and I were owned by after we were married. She spent about
the first 6 months of her life at Grand Canyon National Park and almost two years in Yellowstone National Park. In both places,
no fences were allowed and dogs weren't allowed to run loose, so she was always tied or on a leash. When we left the Park Service
and moved into a house with a fence, she didn't know what to do at first with her very own yard to roam in.

Baron, an American Staffordshire Terrier, was bought by my parents when I was little after my father lost his beloved cocker spaniel to a
roving band of neighborhood dogs. A family friend in California, who had raised pit bulls, recommended the breed and helped pick him out. He
was supposed to be my father's dog, but Baron had other ideas. While he certainly bonded to the rest of the family as well, his heart belonged to
my mother, probably because she rescued him from the train depot after a couple of days journey from California. He would sit at the door and
wait for her to come home, sometimes howling or moaning if he knew she hadn't gone far. If we'd been gone for long, he'd race through the house
in delight, richoceting off doors, walls, furniture and anyone foolish enough not to seek refuge on something out of the way. He never picked a
fight and never killed another dog, but after one experience with him neighbor dogs never came back to challenge him again.

We did have to keep him tied up, though, because he was determined to rid the world of any porcupines he could find. Despite our best efforts,
he had very close encounters with them seven times. The first time we took him to the vet to have the quills pulled. After that, we hauled out the
pliers and did it ourselves. He was remarkably patient and only fussed once, which was due, we discovered later, to my uncle getting hold of a bit
of tongue along with a quill.

Despite his dislike of porcupines, he was tolerant of a wide variety of pets that shared our lives with him,
including an assortment of cats, parakeets, my pet lizard Edgar, and a duck named Alexander.

Pom Pom was my parents' Pomeranian, a strangely aloof little creature, loving in her own way who never quite
bonded with anyone except "her" cat, Thomas, probably because she spent her puppy days in a pet shop.
Corky was a brash, bold and utterly fearless parakeet we had when I was growing up. He had a vocabulary of over 200 words,
including some that would make your ears curl. Once he learned how to open the door on his cage he had the freedom of the house.
Pyewacket, named for the cat in "Bell, Book and Candle," was almost completely black, with yellow eyes and a Siamese yowl.
On the night of the 1959 Montana earthquake, he was asleep on the roof of our house. After the quake, he prowled the roof
yowling, stopping occasionally to peer down at us with those enormous yellow eyes.
Thomas was a large yellow tom who decided he liked my parents' house better than anyone else's and came to stay.
He was quiet, mellow and very patient. to the point of letting our bull terrier sit on him and wash his face, without doing
anything more than waiting for someone to rescue him.
Itsy originally belonged to neighbors of my parents. They abused and neglected her, then abandoned her when they moved
out. It took two days to coax her out from under our mobile home, but once she discovered she was safe and would be loved,
she gave her heart to us. She was smart, sassy, bossy, and utterly fearless when it came to bossing neighborhood dogs
around, even if most were bigger than she was.
King was a cocker spaniel we had when I was growing up. My uncle brought a pair of them home as puppies,
giving one to me and one to my grandparents. When we got Baron, the two of them couldn't agree on who would be boss,
so King moved to live with my grandparents, about a mile away. I was always his, however, and when his brother Ruffles
died after a long and happy life, King moved back to our house. We still had Baron, so King took up residence in my Dad's shop.
Alexander was one of two ducklings given to me by our neighbor for Easter one year. The other died and Alexander was
raised in a box behind the stove in the house until the weather was warm enough for him to move outside. Alexander did not
consider himself a duck - he thought he was a dog, and attached himself to our pit bull, much to Baron's disgust.
Alexander's favorite entertainment was to wait until Baron stretched out on the front porch for a nap in the sun and then sneak
up and peck a sore toenail. Baron would roar awake and pursue a flapping and quacking Alexander around the house.
Both knew grabbing Alexander was strictly forbidden, but sometimes it was close. Alexander was also known to nip ankles
of visitors he took a dislike to and could make almost as much noise as Baron when anyone came in the yard.